Posts Tagged: social networks

1. The Boyd articles discusses how teens create and update SNS profiles based on their perceived audience? How do we portray ourselves different on the Web than we would in other mediated spaces and why do we do so?

2. What implications will we see from the way that teens and young adults use the Web today? How will it change the way society views certain behaviors, or will it change it at all?

I can’t provide an answer here that has any kind of scientific or research-based evidence. However, I can say that I think people are narcissistic by nature. They want to show themselves off and they want to show themselves off in a positive light. People have a tendency to post things that communicate the “OH MY LIFE IS SO GREAT!” message. Or if they are going through a hard time they may take the “WOE IS ME, FEEL SORRY FOR ME!” approach.

We don’t know the implications of these public portrayals yet. It will be interesting to see the news agencies pull up 30 year old Facebook pictures of Presidential candidates getting drunk or high at a party in college. Or using status updates/comments from decades before to enhance political mudslinging. It seems like our society will lower its moral standards as life becomes more and more public. We’ll see that even the woman who sits next to us in church every Sunday has a tagged Facebook photo of her making out with the preacher at a bar.

Everyone has an intrinsic desire to be liked. We want people to envy our lives, to think we’re cool. That’s why we stalk our ex-boyfriends or our current bf’s ex-girlfriends. We want reassurance that our lives are better than our enemy’s. We need the competition to thrive, so we post things to make our lives into a narrative, filled with drama, comedy, successes and failures.

3. How will WikiLeaks affect how government is run? Will transparency become a bigger priority if officials are afraid of being caught up in corruption? Or will we have to move toward a more militant and secretive state in order to protect sources and information?

I think our discussion in class today was really interesting regarding transparency. Wikileaks hopes to encourage transparency in government but is unable to provide transparency within its own organization. However, I do think the fear of being caught it enough to keep officials and governments more transparent. It could work the opposite way in cultures that already have a more militant or dictatorial governments but in systems that value democracy and power of the people, I believe it will work to the benefit of the governed.

In the article, Social Network Sites: Public, Private, or What? the author brings up a lot of good points about young people and social networking websites. Some of the questions that popped into my head were the following:

1.) I really liked the idea of the young people “sticking it to the man” and creating fake beer events to fool the watchful eyes of authority. This makes me wonder, is it really effective for people to use social networks as a trustworthy resource for disciplinary action?

2.) I also like how the article pointed out that some educators are embracing social media as a learning tool. Is this a promising strategy or were educators right to be wary of the dangers of social media?

Week 10: Privacy and Information Ethics

Social Network Sites: Public, Private, or What?
– Boyd
1.  Online social networks have changed the world we know today.  What are some of these changes and are they more of a positive or negative effect on society?

2.  The article mentions how educators are requiring more help from their students than ever before when learning about new technologies and the Internet.  Of the educators that see social networks and our new online world as an evil, do they actually have enough background understanding to make this type of negative assumption?

3.  Social network sites are the latest generation of ‘mediated publics’ – environments where people can gather publicly through mediating technology.  Unmediated public spaces are like malls, cafes, and parks.  This article says, “public spaces have many purposes in social life – they allow people to make sense of the social norms that regulate society, they let people learn to express themselves and learn from the reactions of others”.  Can social networks correctly be classified as public spaces (mediated or not) even though most people’s social network personalities don’t accurately represent the real person?

Facebook privacy settings: Who cares?
– Boyd and Hargittai

1.  Is it possible that because younger generations that currently don’t care about the privacy setting controversies on Facebook haven’t had as many real-life situations (professional careers, marriage relationships, long term community reputations, etc) will change their minds when the effects of Facebook postings begin effecting their lives on a grander scale as they grow older?

2.  Is the flow of information on the Internet too free?  Has it gotten to the point that we need to enforce identity and privacy issues similar to those that outline most forms of information outlets?  Why has the Internet been branded the untouchable free information source if it has negatively effected out global community in so many ways?

WikiLeaks
1. Will WikiLeaks dominate this online niche or will we see new sites popping up that provide the same (or similar) service in the future?

2. Should WikiLeaks be allowed to continue?  Although the service exposes issues in our world society, should this type of detective work be left to watchdog journalism?

Great! We are all connected and love each other and can express and develop that online!

I’m not so sure that this is the best possible thing. I’m also skeptical of how far this can go and what it says about human development.

Are there specific activities that will ALWAYS need person-to-person contact? School? Sports? Or will we just live online in avatar form?

What are the negative consequences to organizing online?

Is this something for the masses or just “witches”, “Bloggers” and “Atheists”?

I do also have some positive notions of the possibilities. How has this technology and world-wide community allowed more developed nations to give access to advanced information abroad? The implications of using this technology in this manner seem quite impactful.